


eat bread and understand comfort

by summerofspock



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Cooking, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff, Humor, M/M, canon typical drinking, plot what plot but domesticity not sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-23
Updated: 2019-11-23
Packaged: 2021-02-27 00:20:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21538114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerofspock/pseuds/summerofspock
Summary: “Well, is there anything that’s ever caught your fancy? Something that crossed your mind and you thought, ‘ah, one day I’ll give that a shot’? Surely there must be.”Crowley bit his lip for a moment, more a brushing of an incisor over the thin line of his lower lip than an actual bite but attuned to Crowley as he was, Aziraphale noticed. He also noticed the way Crowley’s eyes skittered to the side before he took another deep drink of his red wine. “Cooking,” he muttered at last.**In which Crowley gets bored, they try to bake bread, and they bicker (a lot).
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 57
Kudos: 560





	eat bread and understand comfort

**Author's Note:**

> this is technically show verse i suppose but i think it reads either way
> 
> this fic started as a writing exercise and while its essentially plotless i hope you enjoy it!
> 
> shout out to @wingittofreedom for betaing most of this
> 
> title from mary oliver's [To Begin With, Sweet Grass](http://www.ayearofbeinghere.com/2015/08/mary-oliver-to-begin-with-sweet-grass.html)

A.Z. Fell and Co. looked different at night. 

Like _Nighthawks_ , it was illuminated from the inside, throwing its surroundings into shadow. It’s windows which, in daytime, seemed dingy and blocked with stacks of books, shone with light and every so often, if one were so inclined to look, a man could be seen through the window pane, smiling. And, every so often, another man could be seen, wearing sunglasses and thin as a rake. 

However, no one did look, because very few people wanted to look at something filled with so much divine and infernal power. So the people of Soho flitted past, not noticing this bookshop that was lit like a candle.

“Listen to yourself,” Aziraphale chided from the front of his bookshop. He knew he had set his glasses down somewhere, he just needed to find them but it was difficult with Crowley being so distracting. Flipping through some of the papers on his desk, he said over his shoulder, “There is absolutely nothing wrong with those crackers and you should stop complaining.”

Crowley leaned against the nearest bookcase which knew better than to creak under his weight. Crowley’s dark eyebrows rose over the shining silver rims of his sunglasses. “Sure about that, angel? Fairly certain these are at least a decade old. Stale, I’d say.”

He looked quite the picture in the soft light of the bookshop and Aziraphale ignored the very familiar tug of attraction in his belly, putting it aside to cast Crowley a disgruntled look before kneeling by his chair in order to feel under his desk. _A-ha!_ Pulling out his prize, Aziraphale turned back to Crowley in time to be hit in the shoulder by a half-eaten cracker.

“See?” Crowley said innocently, bottom lip poking out as if to say _don’t blame me, I just speak the truth_. “If that were a proper cracker it would have crumbled to bits. They’re like hardtack.”

Aziraphale looked at the cracker on the ground next to his knee and then back up at Crowley who was losing his battle with a laugh. To the rest of the world it was the middle of the night but in the bookshop it was high noon and the light of the chandelier casting mirages off of Crowley’s glasses felt like a challenge.

Aziraphale picked up the cracker and stood, slipping his glasses onto his nose and dusting off his trousers. “Really, Crowley,” he admonished with a shake of his head. “Wasting food. I’d think you knew better.”

Moving to walk past Crowley, nose in the air—Aziraphale knew how to get a rise out of him—Aziraphale listened to Crowley work through a series of inarticulate noises that meant he was searching for the right sarcastic remark. Aziraphale smiled placidly, turned to him, crumpled the cracker in his hand and let the dust fall on Crowley’s head.

The crumbs fell among the artfully disordered strands of Crowley’s hair, sticking in places and trailing down his aghast face in others, obscuring the lenses of his glasses as he stared at Aziraphale in shock.

“What the—”

“If you don’t approve of the quality of my crackers, perhaps you should have stayed at home,” Aziraphale said primly, flouncing—as much as one could flounce in his trousers and waistcoat—to the reading nook in the back of the shop where he had opened up a new bottle of Cote Rotie and was just letting it breathe.

As always, Aziraphale filled a glass for himself and then one for Crowley, leaving it to sit on the table to the left of the settee before settling into his own chair closer to the wall. It was a nice arrangement, good for Aziraphale to lean back when he wanted. Good for Aziraphale to not be too close to Crowley because then _things_ started to take root in Aziraphale’s brain like _oh it wouldn’t be so bad if you touched his arm_ or _leaned in closer to breathe in that woodsmoke smell_ or _even take his hand and kiss the scar on his thumb that you have no idea how he got and don’t know how to ask about._

How do demons get scars?

Grumbling, Crowley appeared between the two bookcases that only semi-hid their comfortable refuge from sight and gave Aziraphale a pointed glare. He had removed his glasses so it really was very...pointy. 

“There are now _crumbs_ on the floor of your precious bookshop, angel. Hope you’re happy,” Crowley said, swinging himself down onto the settee with a swivel of his hips that made Aziraphale’s own hips pulse in sympathy at such disregard for how joints work.

“I think you’ll find that there aren’t,” Aziraphale said, banishing any remnants with a thought.

Crowley scoffed and tossed his legs out over the cushions, running a hand through his now crumb-free hair.

“You’re in rare form tonight, my dear,” Aziraphale said and Crowley tilted his head lazily on his neck to look at him, one hand still tossed behind him, fingers playing idly with the topmost strands of his hair. 

“Wassat supposed to mean?” Crowley asked, slurping on his glass of wine like it was soda and not a nearly thousand pound bottle of very fine Guigal Cote Rotie. 

Aziraphale resisted the urge to snatch the glass back and remind Crowley there was no rush, they could _enjoy_ themselves, they had all night and tomorrow and the day after. All the days after. But he didn’t like to say those things because they reminded him that he’d spent the better part of the last century telling Crowley to slow down. And now Aziraphale felt—well he rather felt a great deal of sympathy for what he had put Crowley through.

Because Aziraphale? He desperately wanted to rush, to topple them down that last step, push them over the finish line. Except it wouldn’t be the finish line it would be the beginning, he supposed. Unfortunately, Aziraphale had no idea how to broach the subject. 

He heaved a sigh. “What I _mean_ , Crowley, is that you’re being awfully childish.”

Crowley squeaked in indignation, slopping a bit of wine over his hand.

“Ornery, if you prefer,” Aziraphale said. He took a nonchalant sip of his own wine. It tasted soft and dry, and oddly like figs.

“Ornery, he says,” Crowley grumbled. “As if he didn’t just toss cracker crumbs on my head.”

“Yes, but _you_ started it!” Aziraphale insisted and realized he was, in fact, being very childish all on his own.

Crowley bared his teeth in a wicked grin before letting his head fall back against the arm of the sofa as his eyes fluttered shut, a candle being dampened, one less light in the room. “Perhaps, I’m bored angel.”

Aziraphale sucked in a breath. That wasn’t at all what he wanted to hear. He _knew_ he was boring. He knew that Crowley was a bit flash and Aziraphale was slow and liked his old quiet things and his routines and over the years, yes, Aziraphale had told himself —had made _excuses_ — like _Crowley would never really want to be with me in that way because I’d bore him. Yes, he’d grow tired of me within a week. This friendship works quite well. Only seeing each other every decade or so._

Aziraphale set down his glass and removed his glasses carefully, folding the temples back and tucking them into the slim pocket of his waistcoat. He cleared his throat. “Well, if you’re bored, I won’t keep you. I suppose I should have known you had better things to do than totter around an old bookshop with a bookshop owner.”

He managed a weak smile that Crowley didn’t even see because he was too busy levering himself into a seated position, the movement so violent that one of his long arms knocked into his knee with too much force and he made a pained _oof_ noise.

“I’m not bored of _you,”_ Crowley insisted, nose scrunching up. “I’m just _bored_. In general. Ya know. Haven’t had much to do lately.”

The tight knot in Aziraphale’s stomach loosened. “Perhaps you could take up a hobby. You know. I have my books You have your…”

“I have my big blasted nothing. I know. You don’t really realize how much time there is until you’ve got no work to do.”

“Yes but you hated work.”

“Yeah but...now I’ve just got time. S’weird.”

Aziraphale hummed and took in Crowley’s fidgety state. He’d come to the bookshop that night, buttoned-up as ever and had seemed fine for a time. But Aziraphale had known Crowley since the very beginning and he knew how to recognize the early stages of his unraveling, when his anxiety grew too strong.

“Well, is there anything that’s ever caught your fancy? Something that crossed your mind and you thought, ‘ah one day I’ll give that a shot’? Surely there must be.”

Crowley bit his lip for a moment, more a brushing of an incisor over the thin line of his lower lip than an actual bite but attuned to Crowley as he was, Aziraphale noticed. He also noticed the way Crowley’s eyes skittered to the side before he took another deep drink of his red wine. “Cooking,” he muttered at last.

“Cooking?” Aziraphale said, surprised. Crowley had never seemed the type. He rarely ate. Though now that Aziraphale thought about it, Crowley did seem to enjoy the ambience of restaurants and the smell of food, always seeming very pleased when Aziraphale enjoyed something. Perhaps—perhaps, it was the prospect of making something to be enjoyed. Well, that _would be_ very Crowley. 

Crowley looked ready to snap at him—very typical, say something revealing and then cover it up with nonsense and bluster—but Aziraphale brushed over it. “Well, I think that’s a brilliant idea. There are all sorts of things I’ve always wondered how to make. Perhaps we could learn together!”

Crowley’s eyes widened a fraction and then he looked down at his cup with a shrug. He grunted as if to say _whatever you like_.

Which was really a ringing endorsement from Crowley if you knew him at all. And Aziraphale knew him quite well thank you very much. _Since the beginning._

“Well what would you like to make? You were complaining about my crackers earlier. Perhaps something salty?” Aziraphale asked, already contemplating a variety of savory treats he’d like to get his hands on.

“What? Right now?” Crowley said, incredulous.

“No time like the present, Crowley!”

“It’s one AM!” he protested.

Aziraphale gave him a disapproving look before setting down his now empty glass.

“Since when has that stopped us from doing something? It’s not as if we have a curfew.”

Crowley groaned. “You’re not going to let this go, are you? I say one bloody thing about _maybe wanting to try something and_ —”

“Look, we are either going to do some sort of...activity—or you are going home because I won’t have you sulking in my shop when I could be—could be reading! Or working!”

Crowley threw himself onto his feet with a truly fantastic groan, slugged back the rest of the wine before grabbing both the bottle and Aziraphale and winking them out of the bookshop.

**

And that’s how they found themselves, Aziraphale poking at cheeses, in the nearest all-night store, the tinny sound of fluorescent lights humming in the background as some sort of bebop played quietly from the loudspeaker.

_It’s gonna take a lot to drag me away from youuu_

“So what do you fancy, Crowley? What should be our first experiment?” Aziraphale asked as he turned a wedge of gruyere in his hands. It had been quite a while since he had had a proper swiss fondue. Perhaps he could tempt Crowley to…

Crowley plucked the cheese from him and put it back. “Whatever you’re thinking, stop thinking it. Start simple, yeah? That’s what they say.”

Aziraphale pouted, an expression that usually worked wonders on Crowley’s will, but the demon just stared back and said, “Stop that. It’s not going to work.”

Aziraphale sighed and looked around. The freezers behind him gave no inspiration, full as they were of pre-chopped green beans and broccoli. 

Crowley’s nostrils flared. “Bread. Let’s start with that.”

“Isn’t that technically baking?”

“Sod off.”

Crowley marched away to the baking aisle and Aziraphale trotted after. A very tired looking woman in scrubs gave him a sideways look and Aziraphale sent her a blessing for restful sleep before coming upon Crowley scrolling through his phone in front of a display of various flours.

Manifesting a black plastic grocery basket on the ground, Crowley placed a small bag of all-purpose flour in it, then yeast, then salt before turning back to Aziraphale. “We need milk and butter.”

Aziraphale nodded and went in search of the items.

When Aziraphale placed his bounty in the basket, Crowley looked at him over the rims of his sunglasses and asked, “What do you fancy on the bread? Jam? Cheese? Best pick now because I’m certainly not coming back here in a few hours because we didn’t think ahead.”

Aziraphale, led rather forcibly by Crowley, selected a very nice spiced fig jam and let the demon drag him out of the shop, back down the street to his flat, complaining under his breath all the while.

The night air had grown progressively cooler, some of the humans, drunk as they were, tucking their hands deeper into the pockets of their dark peacoats, ducking their heads against the sharp wind. Aziraphale wanted to shuffle closer to Crowley, maybe feel some of his intrinsic heat through the thick fabric of his coat. No matter how much he wanted it, he knew he wouldn’t. So he grasped his fingers tighter around the plastic bags from the shop and focused on the way the air made his eyes prick.

“I can’t believe I’m about to bake bread at 2 AM,” Crowley said, jamming his finger against the button in the elevator that would take them to his floor.

“You didn’t _have_ to,” Aziraphale retorted, flapping his jacket to release some of the cold air that had gathered about his hips.

“What? And put up with your huffing?” Crowley tossed out before slipping through the silvery elevator doors when they opened.

Aziraphale didn’t have anything to say to that. He’d like to say that of course he wouldn’t huff if Crowley didn’t want to do something, but he also knew that if they weren’t doing something, Crowley would have continued being a fidgeting mess and Aziraphale could hardly stand for that.

Crowley’s lock turned and the demon pushed the door open with his shoulder, the lights in the atrium coming on as he entered. For a moment, his hair flashed like coal catching fire and then the image dimmed, the lights settling into themselves. Aziraphale followed after him, setting their things in the kitchen and then pausing. To be perfectly honest, he wasn’t sure what to do. Something about activating the yeast. He did know that.

Looking over the ingredients, Aziraphale pondered. Did Crowley know what to do? Was he going to look it up on his little internet gadget?

When he turned to Crowley to ask, his mouth went dry. Crowley had shrugged off his jacket and was steadily folding up his shirt, exposing the delicate bone of his wrist, a delicate thing that Aziraphale had the sudden urge to grip in the palm of his hand. Each fold revealed another inch of skin, another dusting of hair whose texture Aziraphale longed to feel against the pads of his fingers, under the press of his tongue.

He sucked in a breath and Crowley looked at him, arching one eyebrow as he switched to his other arm, rolling back the sleeve there, the same tantalizing dance. Right. Clearing his throat, Aziraphale turned back to the ingredients and said, “Where do we start?”

Crowley snapped his fingers and a silver bowl stacked with measuring cups appeared on the worktop by the sink. “Measuring,” he said. Aziraphale moved to take the bowls and Crowley stopped him. “Nuh-uh-uh. Tottle off. Get yourself a drink.”

“Aren’t we doing this together?”

“Baking bread isn’t exactly a partnered activity,” Crowley said, already setting out specific spoons and cups with focused intent.

“Well, how about I make my own while you make yours? A competition of sorts!” Azirphale said, liking the idea the minute he said it. Crowley was a sight to behold when he was competitive, face all pink and eyes blazing. Aziraphale fondly remembered the first time he had beaten Crowley at Scrabble. He’d been a right pain for _several_ days after. Not even to begin to talk about the debacle that had been Monopoly.

Crowley bared his teeth and grumbled mockingly, but snapped his fingers so a matching set of bowls appeared. “Fine, but I’m not helping you.”

Aziraphale took off his coat and rolled up his own sleeves. “I don’t need your help.”

He snapped his fingers and a tan and blue tartan apron appeared around his belly in the same moment a cookbook appeared in his hand, already open to the right page.

“There’s a dear,” he said to the book absentmindedly, smoothing one hand down the front of his apron as he reached out to set the book on the worktop, propped against the backsplash.

Plucking his glasses from where they were still safely nestled in his waistcoat—he had to finagle his fingers behind his apron but yes, they were still there—Aziraphale slipped them on his nose and then peered down at the book.

Activate the yeast.

See! He did know a few things.

Tapping his finger against his cheek in thought, he turned to the kitchen island to retrieve a packet of yeast before Crowley could disappear it just to foil him.

Aziraphale rifled through one of the bags for a moment before Crowley drew his attention with a small grunt of distress. Turning to him, Aziraphale said, “Crowley, are you al—”

Crowley was staring at him, jaw slack and working like he was simultaneously trying to close it and also say something. The apples of his cheeks were very pink and his hands were frozen in mid air, one holding a measuring cup and the other an empty yeast packet.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale repeated and it seemed to jumpstart Crowley’s thoughts because he nearly shuddered before forcing out a choked laugh, focus entirely turned to his hands.

“You look ridiculous,” he said, a little manic and Aziraphale looked down at myself.

“Really?” he asked, suddenly self-conscious. He liked his manifested apron. “Is it the tartan?”

Crowley made a high pitched keening noise but didn’t reply. Shrugging off his strange behavior— Crowley could be awfully judgmental—Aziraphale took one of the two remaining yeast packets and returned to his station with his bounty.

At some point, Crowley started some music and it poured through the archway that led to the living room.

It was some crooner that Aziraphale didn’t recognize, but found himself enjoying it, the tinny voice fading into the background as he heated the milk with a miracle. Crowley clucked his tongue behind him.

“S’cheating.”

Aziraphale ignored him and went on with his work.

After a bit of flour and a lot of mixing, he had something resembling a dough that he now had to ‘knead.’ He looked over at Crowley who was working on his bread, moving in a strange rhythm as he pushed into the dough. Huff, press, release. Huff, press, turn. A lock of his hair had fallen forward over his forehead and was flopping with each movement.

Aziraphale redirected his very intense urge to touch Crowley—smooth back the lock of hair, push him against the worktop, get his hands on the slim line of his black shirt where it was tucked into his trousers—into working on his own dough. To be perfectly honest, he had no idea what he was doing, but he enjoyed the soft texture of the dough under his hands and the way it firmed the longer he worked it.

When the dough was smooth, he looked down at it and decided it was quite good enough. Now for _proving_ apparently. 

After settling the lump of dough back into its bowl, he covered it with a cloth serviette and turned back to Crowley only to find the demon leaning against the counter, watching him, his face unreadable in the bright kitchen light.

Stepping forward, Crowley seemed to unfurl, hands coming down to his sides as he approached Aziraphale. He plucked at the front of Aziraphale’s apron and scoffed. “Ridiculous.”

Aziraphale looked down at Crowley’s hand where it pulling slowly away from his chest. He wanted to grasp at it, tug him closer, maybe—

A puff of white dust exploded in Aziraphale’s face and he spluttered.

Crowley cackled as he scuttled away. “Oh no, you will _not_ ,” Aziraphale said, grasping a handful of sugar and tugging Crowley back by his belt loop, his superior strength catching Crowley by surprise so he was pulled back almost entirely against Aziraphale, the flour stuck to his front transferring easily to Crowley’s black shirt.

For the second time that night, Aziraphale poured something over Crowley’s head, the granules of sugar working their way through his hair and spilling down his collar. He tried to pull away but Aziraphale held him fast, palm coming down to the top of his head as sugar fell over his face and onto the ground. 

Crowley reared back and elbowed Aziraphale in the solar plexus, knocking the wind from him and pushing him away hard enough that Aziraphale stumbled back, shocked to find a patch of Crowley’s trousers in his hand. 

Crowley looked equally shocked. “What the fuck?” 

Aziraphale held up his hands as if to say _don’t_ _shoot_ and the belt loop fell to the ground, a forlorn black squiggle in a pile of flour and sugar.

“You started it?” Aziraphale said meekly, an echo of their earlier tussle in the bookshop, and Crowley whirled around, looking a fright, half dusted in sugar and flour and shirt rumpled from where Aziraphale had tugged at him.

Crowley’s lips pulled back and Aziraphale felt a flash of anxiety that dissipated swiftly when Crowley started laughing. It was a gorgeous thing, Crowley laughing. When he clutched at his chest like his heart might burst from it, his head tipped back and his stomach shaking. It was so rare. Crowley often favored a scoff or a harsh sound of amusement. Often he laughed in derision. But this? Joy? It felt like a beacon to Aziraphale. Bright as a flame. 

“Ah fuck, you’re a nightmare, you know that?” Crowley said, shaking his head. He grabbed the bottle of wine, long forgotten on the edge of the worktop, and added, “C’mon. We have to wait for it to prove and I’m not going to stand around and let you to _assault_ me again.”

Aziraphale blustered something about retaliation and all’s fair in war but Crowley wasn’t listening, bobbing his head to the strains of music that Aziraphale still couldn’t place.

“What is this?” Aziraphale asked when they entered the living room, wandering to the gramophone to inspect the record. 

“Ink Spots,” Crowley said as he poured two glasses of wine. “American. Surprised you haven’t heard of them.”

“Perhaps I have,” Aziraphale said with a last look at the spinning record before joining Crowley on the couch. “They sound awfully familiar.”

With a start Aziraphale realized he hadn’t miracled himself clean and neither had Crowley, a smear of flour on the back of the sofa alerting him to the fact. “Oh—oh dear!” Aziraphale said, immediately swiping at the stuff but Crowley knocked his hand away.

“Don’t worry yourself over it.”

Crowley snapped his fingers and they were both clean, couch immaculate. Aziraphale tingled with the wave of Crowley’s power and bit back a satisfied sigh. It was like sinking into a warm bath. Delicious and comforting.

“Let’s get sozzled,” Crowley said, shoving an extremely full wine glass into Aziraphale’s hands.

“We only have an hour,” Aziraphale said but he still took the glass.

“Sounds like a challenge if I ever heard one.”

Crowley tipped the bottle into his mouth, draining the last mouthful before slamming it down on the coffee table and staring at it until it refilled itself. “Best get cracking,” he said, grinning in that wicked way of his.

“Foul tempter,” Aziraphale said out of the corner of his mouth, but he kept drinking anyway.

It turned out an hour was plenty when you were two immortal beings with plenty of practice getting intoxicated. Crowley got drunk enough to take off his glasses—Aziraphale’s favorite level of Crowley drunkenness because he was drunk enough to be bombastic but still lucid and his eyes, _his eyes_ —Aziraphale tried not to think too much about it—and Aziraphale got drunk enough to find it very difficult to look away from the wide gestures of his hands.

Thankfully for him, Crowley had set a timer that rang out an hour later and had Crowley swaying onto his feet with all the grace of a newborn giraffe. “Thass me,” he said, looking at Aziraphale with pleasant surprise. “Thass muh bread!”

Aziraphale laughed as Crowley tottered out of the room on unsteady slithering legs. It was like some sort of disastrous dance that Aziraphale couldn’t look away from. Then he realized he had to check on his own bread. 

Through a haze of wine, their respective loaves (cut and rolled and scored—who knew something as simple as bread was so complicated?) ended up in the oven and Aziraphale found himself on the floor, tartan apron spread out between his legs and his feet firmly in a dusting of flour and sugar that still hasn’t found itself elsewhere.

Crowley dropped down next to him, a bottle of wine appearing in his hand. Blinking over at him, Aziraphale smiled. “We made bread,” he said proudly and then he scowled. The kitchen was bright. Too bright.

Snapping his fingers, the lights dimmed, helping warm the room despite it’s austere metal appliances and black marble worktops. Aziraphale had no idea why Crowley even kept a kitchen when it basically looked like a hospital.

“Don’t count your chickens, angel,” Crowley said, leaning back against the cabinet in such a way that his bicep pressed against Aziraphale, delicate as anything and surely unintentional.

“Pardon?” Aziraphale asked. “Chick—chickens?”

“Yanno, before they hatch. Bread isn’t baked yet so don’t get too excited,” Crowley said, the words a bit of a drunken jumble as he leaned into Aziraphale and then away again, a snake charming its victim. Or more likely a Crowley losing its balance.

Thoughtlessly, Aziraphale leaned closer to Crowley to keep him upright, his hand going to Crowley’s forearm to ground him. Only then did he register the sensation of Crowley’s bare skin under his fingers, the soft down of his arm hair.

Aziraphale forced himself to look Crowley in the eye, but the demon was doing a very good job to staring into the middle distance, clearly lost in some thought. He took a pull from the bottle.

“You were right,” he said finally. Aziraphale’s thumb was running back and forth over his wrist without his permission but the texture was silky and fascinating under the sensitive pad of his finger.

“What?” Aziraphale asked. Crowley opened his eyes and for a moment they were sharp, all of his drunken softness fading.

“‘M not bored now,” he said quietly and, drunk as Aziraphale was, he was certain Crowley’s eyes flickered to his mouth.

There were two loaves of bread baking in the oven, it had been over a year since the world hadn’t ended and it was running on 3 AM on a Tuesday in October when Aziraphale closed the distance between them and kissed Crowley for the first time.

He misjudged a bit and caught the corner of Crowley’s mouth, the sharp edge of his nose digging into Aziraphale’s cheekbone before he readjusted and their lips brushed together once, then again, more confidently. Aziraphale distantly heard the sound of the wine bottle hitting the tile, the steady clink as it rolled away, before Crowley’s hand came up to his cheek, tugging him closer, a clash of teeth.

Aziraphale fisted his hands in the fabric of Crowley’s shirt and pressed back, tasting wine in his mouth and relishing the sharp exhalations against his cheek. 

Crowley pulled away, a dull thunk as his head connected with the wooden cabinet behind him. His eyes were frantic, mouth slack. “Why did you do that?” he asked and Aziraphale’s heart broke because he sounded afraid.

“I wanted to,” Aziraphale answered, reaching between them and pressing his open palm to the center of Crowley’s chest. He imagined he could feel the beat of his heart just...there under his thumb. “Very much.”

And then Crowley was kissing him again, pressing him back against the cool steel of the refrigerator, tipping his head back with both hands and curling his tongue into his mouth, an unbearable heat burning Aziraphale from the inside out.

Aziraphale’s hands came up to Crowley’s back to slip under his shirt, feeling the bones of his spine and his cool skin, taut over thin muscle. He thought perhaps he never wanted to stop kissing Crowley and then the demon threw one leg over his hips to straddle him, leaning back and tugging at the front of his apron again.

“This apron…” Crowley began, lips shining from their kisses, “Driving me mad, you know.”

“No, I don’t know,” Aziraphale breathed, shaking his head, bewildered as he tried to pull Crowley closer again. Crowley followed without complaint and—thank goodness—they were kissing again.

All thoughts of too-bright lights and baking bread were chased from his mind by the reality of Crowley under his hands, the warmth of his body and Aziraphale tugged at his shirt, wanting to see more, be closer, be everywhere.

At some point, Crowley lost his shirt and Aziraphale’s apron and waistcoat were tossed aside, his shirt unbuttoned and vest rucked up. Crowley’s hands clutched at the soft flesh of his belly and Aziraphale pushed him against the pale gray floor. Wrapping the end of Crowley’s knotted scarf in his hand, Aziraphale kissed him once more.

An acrid smell tickled Aziraphale’s nose. It wasn’t Crowley’s woodsmoke and salt smell but…

Aziraphale tore himself away. "Oh, the bread!” he cried, eyes going wide.

Crowley looked up at him from the floor, disheveled and half dressed, extremely confused before realization dawned. “Oh _shit_.”

Scrambling on his knees to the oven, Crowley yanked open the door. He looked quite ridiculous in just his tied scarf and trousers, hair standing on end and streaks of flour all down his back from where they had laid down on the dirty floor. Aziraphale smiled when Crowley cursed, pulling out their not insignificantly singed bread.

Crowley tossed the baking pan onto the stovetop and stood. “Fuck.”

Aziraphale clambered to his feet and inspected the damage. It wasn’t nearly as bad as Crowley made it out to be. Yes, the ends of the loaves were charred but somewhere in the middle they were simply a deep golden brown that could absolutely be salvaged. “I don’t suppose you’d let me,” Aziraphale said, gesturing with his hand but Crowley slapped it down.

“What? _Oh lord heal this bread_?” Crowley asked with an unimpressed quirk of his mouth. “No, we were supposed to do this powerless.”

Aziraphale had never agreed to that but the scowl on Crowley’s face made it evident that this wasn’t the time to point it out.

Smoothing his hand over Crowley’s back, Aziraphale pointed at that golden middle. “I believe that part—well, that part is just fine.”

Crowley looked at him but didn’t say anything, just picked up the singed loaf in his hand without even a flinch at the surely searing heat, tearing off the burnt ends and splitting the remaining loaf in half for them to share.

They sat on the shockingly comfortable—for how industrial they looked—barstools and spread heaps of fig jam on the bread which turned out to taste slightly charred but buttery and delicious in the end. Neither of them pointed out that they were both half clothed as bread filled their bellies and the gummy feeling of sobriety washed over them like the morning sun that was making its first forays into the sky.

It didn’t take very long for Aziraphale to notice the way Crowley kept glancing at him, nervous and uncertain. Aziraphale empathized acutely. Snogging on the kitchen floor while wildly intoxicated had not been his first choice when he had imagined kissing Crowley for the first time.

 _He kissed me back_ , Aziraphale reminded himself.

“Listen,” Crowley began eventually as the smell of smoke drifted through the kitchen, thin streams of it catching in the drips of sunlight filtering through Crowley’s skylights. “We can say we were drunk. If you’d like.”

Aziraphale put down his bread and took Crowley’s hand, fig sticky fingers duly ignored. “I’d rather not. In fact, I’d rather do it again. Maybe on the couch, or the bed. I’d like to do it sober, in the daytime, in the dark, and every day until you’re tired of me.”

Crowley exhaled a long breath. “Don’t think I could get tired of you.”

“Sounds like a challenge,” Aziraphale remarked and, feeling rather wicked, he reached out and smeared fig jam down Crowley's cheek.

Crowley turned to him slowly and then lifted the bread in his hand like a weapon. "Want to play it like that then?"

Aziraphale laughed as Crowley battered him with chunks of burnt bread. He supposed he had asked for this.

**Author's Note:**

> [you can find me on tumblr here](https://summerofspock.tumblr.com)


End file.
